


Our Halfway House

by roguesparrow



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Harvelle's Roadhouse, Reflection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-19 20:44:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10647720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roguesparrow/pseuds/roguesparrow
Summary: “These aren’t our memories to mess with, Sam. This place meant something to more than just us…it’s a hunters place, and it always will be.”





	Our Halfway House

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a ficbattle with boopish, from the word 'halfway'. My first writing for a very long time, so please let me know what you think!

It stands, forlorn.

The rusting windmill in the forecourt creaks eerily in the spring breeze. Weeds and vines creep up through the broken windows, climbing up the bare walls, imbedding themselves into the dry wood. Once a large building, a number of the outer walls have been destroyed and collapsed in, with only the blackened struts jutting out in the open air like jagged teeth. Time and the elements have taken their toll inside – the walls are faded, paint once lovingly chosen rotten and peeling. Nature has begun to encroach here, too - a table, broken and badly burned, shelters an animal’s nest. Tattered rags of curtains have been dragged into the alcove, flashes of colour entwined amongst the litter. On the soot streaked floor surrounding the table personal items are scattered – books, a jacket, a pair of glasses. An ancient teddy bear, dirtied and worn with age, is just barely able to be seen underneath a pile of rubble.

Within these walls, a little girl grew. Cracked frames show old pictures of a small family, the young girl in the photo pulling a face to her mother’s disapproval and father’s laughter. Another showed her in her father’s arms, long blonde pigtails trailing down her. The frames had been repaired multiple times, photos carefully replaced. A more recent looking photo had been less carefully treasured – a small hole in the corner revealed it was pinned to a board at some point. The blonde was much older, with a half-smile now, raising a glass to the camera alongside her mother. The picture flutters in a gust and is swept away, coming to rest at the foot of an upturned barstool. Glass litters the floor here, broken bottles of all shapes and sizes, glinting in the afternoon light. A tumbler, miraculously intact, rests on the faded green felt of a warped pool table, beside splintered cues scattered and embedded across its surface. Dark, unsightly stains mar the fabric. Deep gouges spoil the carved wooden legs and continue across the floor, long and threatening. A leather binder, torn and discoloured, lay open and abandoned, half hidden under the twisted remains of a dartboard. There are more personal items here – a cheap watch, a notebook -

A gun.

It lays at the base of the bar, as if it had been flung away in a hurry, as if it had been useless. If someone were to look carefully, it may have been noticed that amongst the glittering glass on the floor other things glinted – bullets. So many bullets, fired so quickly, to no avail. Farther from the bar, toward the hanging front door, a stained knife handle sticks up from the dry ground. The blade is distorted, rendered unusable as if by a blistering heat. Nearby a small metal flask lay opened, its contents long gone dry, a cross painstakingly engraved on its side. A sudden, stronger breeze swings the door on its rusted hinges, dislodging the well-used rosary hanging from the split doorframe and sending it tumbling to the ground in a cloud of dust. Above, the corrugated iron lining the porch roof groans ominously, already bowed with age and the weight of the sign it supported. In pieces now, the light up sign once signalled peace and rest for many people, people who struggled to find a safe place as they are the few that truly know the dangers. They are the people who save at the risk of their own lives. Here, they once traded secrets, methods, contacts. Here, they once celebrated the lives of those lost, in this halfway house named after a loved one lost long ago. Here, they mourned, for the living and the dead, for the lives they would never truly experience and for the lives cut short. Because they are the people who sacrifice.

They are the people who hunt.

Harvelle’s Roadhouse.

It stands, forlorn.

….but not forgotten.

Across the dusty highway, Dean sits on the hood of the Impala, rolling an unopened beer bottle in his hands. He watches the sunlight lengthen his shadow until another comes to stand beside him. He turns to look at his brother, uncapping his beer and sighing.

“Ten years, Sammy…”

Sam nods. “I know. We come every year, but it never changes.” He pushes his hair from his eyes and looks solemnly over at the Roadhouse. “Do you think one day we should…I don’t know…”

“Fix it up?”

Sam shrugs. “It just seems –“

“No,” Dean interrupts, shaking his head slowly. “These aren’t our memories to mess with, Sam. This place meant something to more than just us…it’s a hunters place, and it always will be.”

“I guess you’re right…”

“Always, Sammy.”

The taller brother snorts. A pensive silence falls for a few minutes, until Dean raises his bottle, inclining his head.

“To the Harvelles, and everything you stood for. I’ll be damned if we see the likes of you again.”

The clink of two bottles echoed as the sun began to set.


End file.
